#Bandcampgold-Chalk It Up To Bad Luck by The Caught Flies

I don’t hang out with the right people to have this debate but….I’ll take Motorhead over Metallica at their best. Motorhead at their best? No. Motorhead really at any phase of existence. Metallica was always trying so hard that I was never convinced, when they tipped over the edge and cut their hair, did alternative and country songs I felt like they were finally being themselves. Motorhead was always confidently and unapologetically Motorhead without posturing or pandering. While The Caught Flies are tucked neatly into the Psychobilly genre they feel as close as Maine is going to come to Motorhead.

The easiest place to find Motorhead on their latest album Chalk It Up To Bad Luck is the song Burning Idol which has the blisteringly intelligent fire breathing flair of No Voices In The Sky (in my top 5 anti-religion songs) from (know your Motorhead) 1916. While I do know the lead singer (Ryan McLellan) from the spoken word poetry scene that did not engender faith in making The Caught Flies work. Poets live on words and fit them in everywhere; their music usually sucks (with obvious huge exceptions like Gil-Scott Heron). He does a fabulous job on this album of not sacrificing any of his advanced lyrical standards while still moving at the insane pace set by Christopher Coletti on drums and taken to the next level by Jason Greenough on guitar and Landon Loveday(Cannot be a real name, totally an alias) on bass. Too Close To The Sun is another shocker in the form of a blistering diss reaching epic proportions, “You wallow in yourself obsessed, depression, a constant malcontent. All eyes are on you hastens the spiral and descent. Your god’s gift and they fall to their knees unsatisfied and so god damned empty inside.” Worst. Christmas. Card.Ever.

Ryan has the voice of a man whose young love was cigarettes but boy does he feel this in his soul. A song like They Walk would be goofy or downright stupid if you couldn’t sell the zombie apocalypse as a reality and not a cute hypothetical. As Motorhead as they sometimes feel my wife is quick to remind me that punk is still very present in the repeating vocal assists and jerky tempo. This is not metal but it’s not not metal. You’ll get it. This is music that would sound incredible playing behind a Robert Rodriguez movie. These songs are meaningful and each has a clear conceptual base but they never cease being fun (example:Bipolar Baby).

Are The Caught Flies my favorite band? Am I gonna marry them? No. They have room to grow and definitely sound like they are at the “hey, were pretty good at this?!” phase. If you stream their first album it is fun, if you stream this one…it’s much better and more developed. So my mind is already putting together the next one. America misses the rock star just a little; we live in a tidy customized musical world of communities who never interact. The Caught Flies have not heard about this at all and I hope no one tells them.